HR: 10:50h
AN: ED42A-03    [Abstracts]
TI: Global teaching of global seismology
AU: * Stein, S
EM: seth@earth.northwestern.edu
AF: Northwestern University, Geological Sciences 1850 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL 60208 United States
AU: Wysession, M
EM: michael@mantle.wustl.edu
AF: Washington University, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, St Louis, MO 63130 United States
AB: Our recent textbook, Introduction to Seismology, Earthquakes, & Earth Structure (Blackwell, 2003) is used in many countries. Part of the reason for this may be our deliberate attempt to write the book for an international audience. This effort appears in several ways. We stress seismology's long tradition of global data interchange. Our brief discussions of the science's history illustrate the contributions of scientists around the world. Perhaps most importantly, our discussions of earthquakes, tectonics, and seismic hazards take a global view. Many examples are from North America, whereas others are from other areas. Our view is that non-North American students should be exposed to North American examples that are type examples, and that North American students should be similarly exposed to examples elsewhere. For example, we illustrate how the Euler vector geometry changes a plate boundary from spreading, to strike-slip, to convergence using both the Pacific-North America boundary from the Gulf of California to Alaska and the Eurasia-Africa boundary from the Azores to the Mediterranean. We illustrate diffuse plate boundary zones using western North America, the Andes, the Himalayas, the Mediterranean, and the East Africa Rift. The subduction zone discussions examine Japan, Tonga, and Chile. We discuss significant earthquakes both in the U.S. and elsewhere, and explore hazard mitigation issues in different contexts. Both comments from foreign colleagues and our experience lecturing overseas indicate that this approach works well. Beyond the specifics of our text, we believe that such a global approach is facilitated by the international traditions of the earth sciences and the world youth culture that gives students worldwide common culture. For example, a video of the scene in New Madrid, Missouri that arose from a nonsensical earthquake prediction in 1990 elicits similar responses from American and European students.
UR: http://epscx.wustl.edu/seismology/book/
DE: 7299 General or miscellaneous
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005